Tenth Doctor – Nerdisthttp://nerdist.com
Thu, 24 May 2018 17:30:35 +0000en-UShourly1https://wordpress.org/?v=4.9.5Fan Art Friday #106 – K-2SO, Scully, and More by Liana Kangashttp://nerdist.com/fan-art-friday-106-k-2so-scully-and-more-by-liana-kangas/
Sat, 04 Mar 2017 04:00:46 +0000http://nerdist.com/?p=484664Let’s celebrate the end of the work week with some art, shall we? Liana Kangas reached out to share her fan art with me and I was smitten faster than you can say ooh and aah. She takes characters she likes from pop culture and interprets them with her distinct style in dreamy watercolors. Look how dang snazzy Rogue One‘s K-2SO looks:

K-2SO (Rogue One)

I like this fan art. The captain said I had to. Just kidding: Cassian’s directives don’t sway me in any particular direction.

You can head on down to the gallery to be enchanted by more of Liana’s portraits. You’ll find Scully from The X-Files, Doctor Who‘s Tenth Doctor, and more. Keep up with her art on the regular by following Liana on Instagram, and if you want to see additional illustrations and maybe add some of them to your home, visit Liana on Etsy.

Do you create any sort of fan art? If so, I want to see it. Whether you focus on a specific fandom or pull inspiration from multiple stories and mediums, I’d like to highlight what you do. If you’re interested in being featured in a future edition of Fan Art Friday, get in touch with me at alratcliffe@yahoo.com with examples of your work. I’m not limited to traditional 2D art, so if you have crafts or bean art or whatever, share it. If you’re not an artist, feel free to email me with recommendations for Fan Art Friday!

Images: Liana Kangas

]]>10 DOCTOR WHO Stories for 10 Years of the Tenth Doctorhttp://nerdist.com/10-doctor-who-stories-for-10-years-of-the-tenth-doctor/
Fri, 29 Apr 2016 16:00:17 +0000http://nerdist.com/?p=395926It seems almost impossible to fathom, but it’s been over 10 years since David Tennant began his run as the Tenth Doctor on Doctor Who. At Christmas time 2005, Tennant donned the pajamas and bathrobe and sword fought with his fightin’ hand to the delight of fans everywhere. He’s been out of the role for six years now and yet the popularity of both him and his era remain stronger than ever. The striped suits, ratty trainers, long brown coat, spectacles, and especially that hair have become icons to cosplayers everywhere.

When I started watching the show, I thought there was no way someone could overshadow Christopher Eccleston for me but it literally took one episode to make me a Tennant fan for just about the entirety of his whole run (we won’t talk too much about “The End of Time”… in fact, that’s it.) To celebrate ten years of the Tenth Doctor, I’ve compiled a list of my ten favorite Tennant stories. They’re in chronological order and unranked, so don’t yell at me.

Also DISCLAIMER: I’m not going to include “Blink” on this list. Yes, it’s a brilliant episode; yes, it’s one of the best ever. But a) it always gets talked about, and 2) the Tenth Doctor is a supporting character in it so why not focus on ones where he takes center stage?

School Reunion
While I was all about the Tenth Doctor with the first episode, it wasn’t until “School Reunion” when a whole new world of Doctor Who opened up. Elisabeth Sladen returned as Sarah Jane Smith, the most beloved companion of the classic series, for an episode which explored the idea of what happens after companions stop traveling with the Doctor. Would they stop caring about aliens and stuff altogether? In Sarah Jane’s case, no; she continued to search for and report the paranormal. And Tennant–a confirmed old-school fanboy–getting to share scenes with her is truly a joy to watch. This episode went over so well that it led to the spinoff series The Sarah Jane Adventures.

The Girl in the Fireplace
While I don’t think this episode fits very well within the season, “The Girl in the Fireplace” is a bang-up awesome standalone adventure. The first Steven Moffat script in the Tennant era, it mixes everything the future showrunner would covet: history, children waiting for frigging ever to become adults, weird time jumps, fears of monsters, and pretending the Doctor is drunk. Even if it ultimately doesn’t make a whole lot of sense for the Doctor and Madame du Pompadour to have that kind of relationship, the fact that he isn’t there, and she has to take the slow path, is very Doctory.

The Impossible Planet/The Satan Pit
Tennant’s first season was a mostly lighthearted, or at least generally happy, affair — even the Cybermen returning in a parallel dimension didn’t truly frighten. But toward the end of series 2, we got a pair of episodes that might still be among the scariest the show’s ever done. “The Impossible Planet/The Satan Pit” took the Doctor and Rose Tyler to a base at the edge of a black hole, where a crew is slowly overtaken by a demonic presence, possibly even the Devil himself. This story also introduced the Ood, and made them VERY creepy, even if they went on to be weird spiritual beings.

The Shakespeare Code
Some people give this episode shade, but I won’t hear of it. As a big Shakespeare nut myself, the script by Gareth Roberts is full of all sorts of great references to famous plays, and in-jokes about Shakespeare lore. Whatever became of Love’s Labours Won? Maybe some dank alien harpies done stole it. I also love that Shakespeare is too clever to be taken in by the psychic paper, and that they filmed in the actual Globe Theater in London. It’s just a really fun episode. The only thing I don’t like about it is the Martha Jones pining-over-the-Doctor sesh that begins in earnest here.

Human Nature/The Family of Blood
Now, the Tenth Doctor isn’t actually in this one very much, but David Tennant sure is and he’s amazing. Hiding his Time Lordiness in a fob watch, he hides from an evil alien clan and lives as a regular human named John Smith, a school teacher on the brink of WWI. Martha, stuck as a maid, is the only one who knows the truth, the custodian of his true identity. The episode is great for contrasting the kind but pitiless Doctor with the decidedly un-heroic but wholly sympathetic John Smith, who is forced to give up a whole life and love in order to save the world. Stupid responsibility.

Utopia
Even though the two episodes that conclude this storyline range from “not so great” to “poop on a stick,” this episode is nothing short of brilliant, bringing back Captain Jack Harkness post-immortality-making and forcing the Doctor to deal with essentially abandoning him. We’re also taken to the very edge of the universe and shown a version of the Doctor’s arch-nemesis the Master, who has also hidden from the world in the guise of a kindly old man. It ends on one of the best cliffhangers of all time, and I super wish the following two episodes had lived up to this one. It’s great.

The Fires of Pompeii
I have to admit something: I wasn’t sure I was going to like Donna Noble (as played by Catherine Tate) when she became the full time companion. Just something about the character rubbed me the wrong way. But after “The Fires of Pompeii,” I was sold and she became my favorite. This is another wonderful example of the Doctor having to make tough decisions pertaining to fixed points in time and whether or not to save people. He can’t divert the eruption of Mt. Vesuvius, nor all the people that die because of it, but it’s Donna’s sense of right and wrong, and her compassion, that leads him to save one family–who so happens to look like a couple of Doctor faces later.

Silence in the Library/Forest of the Dead
This is a story that I liked at the time but it has gone way, way up in my estimation in the years hence. While the second half with Donna “saved” in the matrix with a new set of memories gets a bit tedious, the mixture of creepy shadow aliens, walking skeleton corpses in spacesuits, and the introduction of River Song really make for great entertainment. And Tennant is brilliant in these episodes, his skepticism about River inches steadily into the realization that she really does know a lot about him.

Midnight
No two ways about it, this is my very favorite Tenth Doctor story of the whole bunch. It’s basically his whole personality in one contained–one room–story. It plays like a stage production, with the small group of characters all dealing with each other and this terrifying unknown and inexplicable alien presence. The Doctor starts out his usual exuberant, chatty self, starts in on his arrogant “because I’m clever” diatribe when things get weird, and get summarily dismissed and even persecuted by the others when the entity decides to make him seem the evil one. It’s a rough 45 minutes, and certainly not uplifting, but it’s so stinking good. And, famously, Russell T. Davies was forced to churn out the script in a weekend, and it was the best thing he ever wrote.

The Waters of Mars
Finally, I’m gonna throw some love to what is, in my humble opinion, the only good episode from the gap year specials. It’s also really damn dark and doesn’t paint the Tenth Doctor in the best light, but it does show a different side to both the character and to Tennant in the role. This is a similar dilemma that he faces in “The Fires of Pompeii,” but without Donna or another companion to keep him honest, he goes way off the rails, calling himself not the survivor of the Time War, but the WINNER of the Time War, which–to him–gives him the right to completely shirk the rules of time. It blows up in his face and leads to his eventual downfall. But despite the sadness, I still love it.

So there we have my ten favorite Doctor Who stories with the Tenth Doctor for his 10th anniversary. Everybody’s got opinions, I’m sure, so be sure to tell me all of your choices in the comments below! And send 10 your birthday wishes, wherever he may be.

]]>DOCTOR WHO Tenth Doctor & Donna Adventures Get Spiffy Trailerhttp://nerdist.com/doctor-who-tenth-doctor-donna-adventures-get-spiffy-trailer/
Wed, 02 Mar 2016 19:30:30 +0000http://nerdist.com/?p=374289One of the best/worst things about Doctor Who is that you always get the feeling we the audience are only getting to see a snippet of all the adventures a particular Doctor and companion are having. They’re always coming from somewhere we’ve never seen and going off to somewhere we won’t experience the following week. It’s usually left to your imagination to fill in the rest, but thanks to Big Finish Productions, you can enjoy some of these between-the-episodes adventures through their fully-produced audio plays, allowing you to imagine what everything looks like!

Now, we get to have a little taste of the highly anticipated audio adventures featuring the Tenth Doctor (David Tennant) and arguably his most popular companion, Donna Noble (Catherine Tate). The two actors are friends in real life and have worked together quite a few times, which was always very evident in their performances during series 4. None of that seems to have gone away in the trio of audio dramas which will be coming out in May, as evidenced by this new trailer.

That sounds like it’s going to be a huge amount of fun, right back to the feel of series 4 and the Doctor and Donna’s good-natured ribbing. Plus, truly is there anything better than listening to Tennant’s Doctor rattle off a long, complicated sentence in the time it takes most of us to say “Um, I don’t know?” I submit that there is not.

The three adventures will be available to purchase individually or as a set. They include “Death and the Queen” by James Goss, “Technophobia” by Matt Fitton, and “Time Reaver” by Jenny T. Colgan. The Time Reaver looks like Cthulhu, fun fact. You can check out the individual story covers in the gallery below!

Are you excited for Ten and Donna to run around your mind palace? (Not meant to sound dirty but I’m still not changing it.) Are three new adventures going to satiate your thirst? Let us know in the comments below!

A photo posted by johnscotbarrowman (@johnscotbarrowman) on Jan 8, 2016 at 10:07am PST

Given how very much I adore both John Barrowman (Have you ever listened to the SDCC Live Nerdist Podcast from 2012? I was there IRL, and he was such a hilarious delight. I highly recommend.) and his fictional alter-ego Captain Jack Harkness, I might just wander over to Funko and order myself a Jack Harkness for my desk because it would bring me that much joy. The thing is, aside from this adorable collection of pictures, which the company shared through their own account as well, there’s little to no information out there as to the exact release date of the new toy that I’m coveting. I couldn’t find it on any sites or anywhere for pre-order, but I’m patient, and I’m sure that eventually my patience will be rewarded.

Captain Jack Harkness joins the Daleks and his beloved Tenth Doctor in the collection, and fans can also look forward to River Song and Rose Tyler joining the gang eventually. It’s so fun to see John Barrowman remain so attached to the adored Doctor Who even as he moves on to other projects. You should probably check him out on Arrow where he’s recently guested alongside River Song herself, Alex Kingston. If the idea of River and Jack together on the small screen doesn’t get you excited, I’m worried you might be a little bit dead inside.

Will you be jumping on the pre-order bandwagon along with me? Tell me in the comments below!

—Image: BBC

]]>DOCTOR’S FINEST Preview – Week 4: The Day of the Doctorhttp://nerdist.com/doctors-finest-preview-week-4-the-day-of-the-doctor/
Sat, 05 Sep 2015 23:00:38 +0000http://nerdist.com/?p=301511We’re halfway through BBC America’s The Doctor’s Finest series, a retrospective of some of Doctor Who‘s best episodes of the past several years, and boy howdy have we had some good ones, and “The End of Time” also. But as good as the likes of “Blink” and “The Doctor’s Wife” are, they are merely runners-up in comparison to what many, including the readers of Doctor Who Magazine called the best Doctor Who episode ever, the 50th Anniversary special, “The Day of the Doctor.”

To discuss this episode Saturday night at 8:00pm ET on BBC America, host Hannah Hart will be joined by someone who was actually there: Ingrid Oliver, who played Osgood, the UNIT tech and mega-Doctor fan (as evidenced by her long Fourth Doctor scarf). Insight and anecdotes will abound!

If you’d like to read my thoughts on the special to end all specials, keep on a-reading!

As a Doctor Who fan, or even just a fan of sci-fi and TV history at large, the 50th Anniversary was inescapable and the anticipation for it and hoopla surrounding it were at a fever pitch. There was a massive convention in London (which I was lucky enough to attend), there were retrospectives and docudramas and every possible thing anyone could want. But there was still the question of whether the episode itself would be good. While I generally enjoyed it, the lead-up in Series 7 had been met with hot and cold reception, though the finale, “The Name of the Doctor,” certainly got people in the spirit, and through a crazy curve ball in there by introducing John Hurt as the Doctor…what?!?!

Since the 10th Anniversary special back in 1973, it had been established that on occasions such as that, past Doctors would show up and interact with each other, owing to both fun nostalgia and the fact that timelines are weird that way. This happened again in 1983, attempted to happen in 1993 when the show was off and only resulted in a crappy (beyond crappy, actually) 15-minute charity special that crossed over with EastEnders. This special in 2013, when the show was actually still on the air, was going to have to be massive. And for that, lead writer/showrunner Steven Moffat was going to need multiple Doctors.

Obviously he had Matt Smith, and David Tennant was pretty much a shoo-in, but the odds of getting Christopher Eccleston were slim-to-none (and, in fact, were none) so Moffat had to think and came up with a crazy history-rewriting, yet totally logical way to have a third Doctor in the episode, by having the Doctor who fought in the Time War be a separate Doctor entirely, which was what John Hurt was, the unnumbered War Doctor. Moffat even gave fans a thrill by creating a short film entitled “The Night of the Doctor” which explains that the Eighth Doctor (Paul McGann) realized he could no longer be a conscientious objector and had to get involved, hence creating the War Doctor. Genius if you ask me.

And so we got this episode, which is everything. Like, literally, it’s everything. The Doctor and Clara get picked up in the TARDIS by a helicopter which takes them to Trafalgar Square to meet with Kate Stewart of UNIT because of a strange painting found in the basement of the National Gallery. It’s a 3D painting called “Gallifrey Falls,” depicting the final day of the Time War. Then a portal opens up and the Eleventh Doctor jumps through and meets the Tenth Doctor in Ye Olde times when he’s wooing Queen Elizabeth the First whom he believes is a Zygon duplicate. Oh yeah, there are Zygons in this too.

While all that’s going on, we see the War Doctor with the secret weapon, the Moment, which we know ended the Time War by destroying both the Daleks and the Time Lords all at once. He travels to an isolated shanty and prepares to use the weapon, but a human personification of the Moment, using the Doctor’s as-yet-unmet Bad Wolf memory, appears and tries to show him the cost of doing such a thing, transplanting him to Elizabethan England as well, and puts the grizzled warrior up against “Chinny” and “Sand Shoes.”

It’s truly amazing to me that this worked, and worked as well as it did. The camaraderie between all the Doctors was hysterical and poignant, the re-writing of all the timelines completely makes sense and yet doesn’t negate the seven series we had previously, and it allowed Billie Piper to return without having to dredge up Rose Tyler yet again. It was glorious! And, perhaps fittingly, Clara got to be what the companion always is: the Doctor’s conscience, and the one who gives him another idea. Every layer works. It’s astonishing.

Plus, Tom Baker showed up. I mean, come on!

Just writing about this again makes me want to watch it, which is convenient because it’s airing Saturday night at 8:00pm ET/PT on BBC America. And next week, we get to say goodbye to Matt Smith when The Doctor’s Finest shows “The Time of the Doctor” with Hannah Hart being joined by YouTuber Charlie McDonnell.

]]>Hannah Hart Interviews Jimmy Wong About DOCTOR WHO’s ‘Blink’http://nerdist.com/hannah-hart-interviews-jimmy-wong-about-doctor-whos-blink/
Mon, 17 Aug 2015 14:30:55 +0000http://nerdist.com/?p=292075This past Saturday was the first night of BBC America’s six-week adventure reliving the best episodes of Doctor Who‘s recent years. It’s called the Doctor’s Finest and it’ll air for the next five weeks, with Hannah Hart hosting and interviewing various luminaries discussing the show and the specific episodes in question. And each week, I’ll be giving my opinion on the episodes (you can read the first one of these right here).

The first two episodes were Series 3’s “Blink” and the special “The Waters of Mars.” Hannah’s first guest was internet star Jimmy Wong. As you can see in the clip above, Jimmy shares the opinion of a lot of Who fans in saying “Blink” is the perfect episode to get new people into the show, because it’s so tightly-scripted and interesting and scary. But, as they later mention, Carey Mulligan, the guest star of the episode, never appears again and she’s really the ep’s main character. I say, if you’re gonna show someone Doctor Who, make it one with the Doctor in it. But hey, what do I know?

Not even current showrunner and “Blink” writer Steven Moffat knows why his episode, which won a Hugo, is so beloved, as he says in the below clip.

You can see more clips, including a look at “The Waters of Mars” and two looks forward to Series 9, on BBC America’s YouTube page. And don’t forget to check back here next Saturday when I tee-up the next episode of Doctor’s Finest where Hannah and comedian Sara Schaefer will watch and talk about “The End of Time.”

Where do you recommend people start Doctor Who? Let me know below!

—

Kyle Anderson is the weekend editor and a film and TV critic for Nerdist.com. You should yell at him about things on Twitter!

This means a whole new generation of Whovians will have the opportunity to immerse themselves into the world of Gallifrey and beyond. The show will be airing in mini-marathon chunks of episodes, perfect for binge watching and dreaming of time travel. Settle in for the ride with your littlest companion and made these adorable (not-at-all frightening) Doctor Who Weeping Angel Cookies. Don’t blink!

In a medium bowl whisk together the flour, baking powder and salt. Set aside.

In the bowl of an electric mixer cream the butter and sugar until combined. Add the egg and vanilla.

Slowly add in the flour mixture until the dough is crumbly. Then add just 1 – 2 drops of Super Black food gel dye. By adding this after the dough is almost done you will get a grayed marble effect.

Beat the mixture together a bit more, just until the dough comes together and looks almost like Bleu Cheese. Don’t mix too far, you will be rolling this out later which will mix it even more. You don’t want all gray dough.

Separate the dough into two and wrap in plastic wrap. Chill in the fridge.

When you are ready to make cookies preheat the oven to 350 degrees and prep cookie sheets with silpats or parchment.

Roll out the dough to 3/8″ thick. You want to make it thick enough to get all of the impressions to show through.
Also, this particular cutter needs a little help, so dip it in flour before you press it into the dough. It will keep it from sticking.

Move the cookies to the prepped cookie sheets and bake for 10 minutes. Let cool on a wire rack.

]]>TV-Cap: ARROW Series Regular Departs the Show, DOCTOR WHO Comes to Disney XD, & Morehttp://nerdist.com/tv-cap-arrow-series-regular-departs-the-show-doctor-who-comes-to-disney-xd-more/
Thu, 16 Apr 2015 16:30:13 +0000http://nerdist.com/?p=243177To everyone who watched last night’s Arrow, I’m sorry. Change is inevitable blah, blah, blah, but can’t some characters just stay around forever and ever? More on the character who left at the very end of today’s recap (so you can remain spoiler-free!), but there’s plenty of other news before you get there. Learn about the Tenth Doctor’s journey to Disney XD, see the trailer for Season 2 of Axe Cop, and find out about Zachary Levi’s new show on Syfy.

Mickey Meets a Time Lord. Disney is showing way more series than your average bubblegum, teenager sort of stuff and cartoons these days. Case in point: They’ve teamed up with BBC to air episodes of Doctor Who featuring the Tenth Doctor (David Tennant) on Disney XD–and only the episodes with the Tenth Doctor. Maybe it will bring some new Whovians to the fold? They’ll air Doctor Who beginning on June 13 and go through June 20. [Nerdist]

Heading Underground. Are you ready for a long journey? WGN America’s working on a series about the Underground Railroad. The show will follow slaves who intend to make the whopping 600 mile trip to freedom. I can’t imagine the hardships of making a journey that long in the pre-Civil War era. At all. Underground doesn’t have a premiere date or anything just yet, but they have cast Adina Porter (True Blood, The 100) in the recurring role of Pearly Mae. [Deadline]

Litchfield Forever, Yo. Season 3 of Orange Is the New Black hasn’t even kicked off, but Netflix has already renewed it for Season 4. They know they have to keep the ladies of Litchfield happy. But back to Season 3: please enjoy a new clip in which meal time gets rather intense. [/Film]

All the Heroes. One of the many tremendous things about having The Flash and Arrow on the same network is the crossover potential. It’s just like reading event comic books except you only have to watch a single episode and not buy 20,000 titles (that’s how crossover events feel to me). This week’s The Flash brought Felicity and and Atom to town, and it was So. Much. Fun. Read Joseph’s review of “All Star Team Up.”

From the Pub to TV. Pour a cold one and prepare to flex your trivia skills because Zachary Levi is bringing Geeks Who Drink to Syfy. The trivia show is based on the national and popular bar event and will pit two teams of three geeks against each other every week; each team will have a celebrity captain. The show premieres on July 16. [TVLine]

Tigers vs. Sharks. Doesn’t Tigers Vs. Sharks sound like a title for an upcoming Syfy film? It’s not a movie title though, it’s part of the trailer for Season 2 of Axe Cop. The cartoon based on the comic by Ethan Nicolle and Malachai is part of the Animation Domination High-Def block on FXX and airs every Thursday. It returns tonight! [CBR]

Don’t Clone Yourself. Nobody panic but Season 3 of Orphan Black debuts this Saturday. It’s a show of clones, conspiracies, mysteries, and some insanely talented actors. And! You still have time to catch up. Alicia lets you know everywhere you can watch the first two seasons before Saturday. May the clone be with you (sorry–I’m at Star Wars Celebration and can’t help it). Also, be sure to check out our clone playlists!

Sidekick Good-bye. Prepare to have some feelings. If you watched “Broken Arrow” last night, you’re probably wondering about Arsenal. He faked his death, and that means Colton Haynes is leaving Arrow. He will appear in one additional episode this season, and a Warner Bros. rep said, “Like all characters that exist in this universe, there will always be the potential for him return moving forward.” I’m in denial. [The Hollywood Reporter]

What are your thoughts on the Geeks Who Drink game show? Let us know about all your feelings in the comments.

]]>DOCTOR WHO’s Tenth Doctor Comes to Disney XDhttp://nerdist.com/doctor-whos-tenth-doctor-comes-to-disney-xd/
Wed, 15 Apr 2015 21:30:50 +0000http://nerdist.com/?p=242900In a very interesting, rather strange merging of brands, the BBC announced today that its flagship program, a little thing called Doctor Who, you may have heard of it, will begin airing on Disney XD (a.k.a. the Disney Channel for older kids) beginning in June. The network already airs programs like Star Wars Rebels and will begin showing a new Fantastic Four which is set to debut May 9th, before which they’ll show the Who episode “New Earth” as a primer. Really, it’s the channel where Disney can put more action-driven programming on the tube, which does seem like it’d be a good fit for Doctor Who which has action and scares but is also family-friendly.

What makes this all the more intriguing is that XD will only be showing the three full series featuring Tenth Doctor David Tennant. That’s right, not even from the beginning of New Who; just from Series 2 to Series 4, “New Earth” to “Journey’s End.” Curious, especially to forsake the beginning of Tennant’s actual term with “The Christmas Invasion.” I’m sure things will get cut out, but considering “The Stolen Earth,” the first part of Series 4’s finale, has Harriet Jones, former Prime Minister (yes, we know who you are) who only appears in Series 1 and “The Christmas Invasion,” there might be some confused kids out there. And how are they going to explain Captain Jack?!

Beginning Saturday, June 13th, and going through Saturday, June 20th, XD will air eight episodes per day, in marathon chunks, and on the 14th, episodes will be available to watch via the Watch Disney XD app.

Matt Forde, EVP Sales & Co-productions, TV, BBC Worldwide North America, had this to say about the partnership: “Disney XD is recognized for its family-friendly programming making the channel a great partner to introduce the David Tennant seasons of Doctor Who to a new generation of viewers.”

Not sure how I feel about those new viewers only getting the David Tennant viewpoint, but this will perhaps lead them to seek out more since, you know, there have been 30 other seasons, 5 in the new series alone, to discover.

What say you? Is the TARDIS big enough for the Disney crowd or should the whole thing be sonic screwdriver’d away? Let us know below!

]]>Inked Wednesday #25 – Zelda, Gizmo, Stormtroopers, & Morehttp://nerdist.com/inked-wednesday-25-zelda-gizmo-stormtroopers-more/
http://nerdist.com/inked-wednesday-25-zelda-gizmo-stormtroopers-more/#commentsWed, 18 Feb 2015 21:00:53 +0000http://www.nerdist.com/?p=226626I don’t know about you, but I’ve lost track of what day it is. Presidents’ Day meant Monday wasn’t a normal day in the office, and now I’m confused. Not that it takes much. Luckily, I looked at my calendar and sorted myself in time to realize that it’s Wednesday and that means it’s Inked Wednesday. As usual, I have plenty of Doctor Who and Star Warstattoos in my queue so you’ll see at least a couple of each in the below gallery. You’ll also find Gizmo from Gremlins, Zelda, and more.

Have geeky ink you’d like to share? Send pictures to me on Twitter or share links in the comments.

]]>http://nerdist.com/inked-wednesday-25-zelda-gizmo-stormtroopers-more/feed/3Fan Art Friday #1http://nerdist.com/fan-art-friday-1/
http://nerdist.com/fan-art-friday-1/#commentsFri, 17 Oct 2014 15:30:14 +0000http://www.nerdist.com/?p=192330Here at Nerdist, we like fans and art so it was only logical to kick off a new tradition: Fan Art Fridays! Artists create amazing things to express their love of any given franchise, and we want to show off some our favorite finds. I’ll showcase different artists and themes every Friday, and I’m starting with Doctor Who.

I don’t know if you know this, but there’s enough Whofan art across the web to fill up a TARDIS. I found illustrations of every Doctor, companion, and villain we’ve seen in the series over the last 50 years and all of those pieces were done in varying styles. It was hard to narrow my choices down, and this gallery is only a small percentage of the beautiful art that’s out there. Take a look:

]]>http://nerdist.com/fan-art-friday-1/feed/2Timey Wimey DOCTOR WHO Cosplay Galleryhttp://nerdist.com/timey-wimey-doctor-who-cosplay-gallery/
http://nerdist.com/timey-wimey-doctor-who-cosplay-gallery/#commentsMon, 18 Aug 2014 23:30:52 +0000http://www.nerdist.com/?p=175541Doctor Who returns with new episodes this Saturday, and to welcome the Twelfth Doctor, Peter Capaldi, and his upcoming adventures, we’ve searched through all of time and space for some fantastic examples of Doctor Whocosplay. The Doctor and his companions and enemies have been both the most stylish and the scariest beings in the galaxy over the last 50 years. From aliens to humans to mash-ups, cosplayers have done it all. So put on a bow tie, slip on some Converse sneakers, place some celery in your shirt pocket, and take a look at some examples of Doctor Who costumes in the below gallery.

Which of these costumes would you travel through time for? Let us know in the comments.

]]>http://nerdist.com/timey-wimey-doctor-who-cosplay-gallery/feed/5DOCTOR WHO Comics Day Vwooorps Forth July 26thhttp://nerdist.com/doctor-who-comics-day-vwooorps-forth-july-26th/
Thu, 17 Jul 2014 01:00:18 +0000http://www.nerdist.com/?p=167739Another fake holiday we can totally get behind. The new ongoing Tenth and Eleventh Doctor comics from Titan Comics‘ new Doctor Who series will hit stands on Wednesday, July 23rd, however it’s that Saturday, on July 26th, that’s the day for fans to celebrate their love of comic book Time Lord action. In fact, it’s been branded Doctor Who Comics Day and will span across comic book stores all over the world. Seems pretty fitting for a book based on a show as globally revered as Doctor Who.

At 3:00pm at Comic-Con, there will be the official Titan Doctor Who comics panel (in Room 23ABC) at which writer Nick Abadzis, artist Elena Casagrande, cover artist Alice X. Zhang, and editor Andrew James will show concept art and reveal storylines for the two series, as well as give fans their first glimpse at interior art from the Twelfth Doctor series which will debut in October. There’s also the promise of some kind of video surprise.

However, even if you aren’t going to be in San Diego for Comic-Con, you can still join the TARDIS-tivities. Each comic book store participating in the event will have three posters – a regular ol’ poster and two instant-Cosplay posters of the Tenth and Eleventh Doctors for fans to “wear” and take pictures in to be tweeted to Titan’s Twitter account, with the hashtag #doctorwhocomics. Editor James will then pick his favorite and that person will win an exclusive goody bag with all kinds of SDCC merch and signed things and the like.

There will also be a cosplay contest wherein people are encouraged to dress up like one of the new comic companions for the Doctor, either Tenth Doctor companion Gabriella Gonzalez or Eleventh Doctor companion Alice Obiefune, and tweet a picture to the same above handle with the same hashtag and the winner’s photo will be turned into a variant cover for an upcoming issue, which is pretty cool.

There are also lots of signings and special events going on in comics retailers all around the globe (though mostly the US and UK). For a complete list of these signings along with the hefty amount of participating comics retailers, go to the official Titan Doctor Who Comic Day news page.

It’s a day everyone should celebrate, whether you’re an Allons-y or a Geromino or a catch phrase of another sort.

]]>The Tenth Doctor Returning to Cinemas June 16thhttp://nerdist.com/the-tenth-doctor-returning-to-cinemas-june-16th/
http://nerdist.com/the-tenth-doctor-returning-to-cinemas-june-16th/#commentsThu, 29 May 2014 18:30:16 +0000http://www.nerdist.com/?p=152577Anyone who got to see “The Day of the Doctor” in cinemas last year knows that watching Doctor Who in a big group, on a big screen, is one of the best experiences a fan can have. Huge amounts of fun. Well, Fathom Events and the BBC think it’s sufficiently awesome as well and are going to bring the show back to theaters as part of a two-night event celebrating Tenth Doctor David Tennant.

On Monday, June 16th, at 7:30pm local time, fans can go to participating theaters and see the two-part Tenth Doctor story “Rise of the Cybermen/The Age of Steel,” the episodes that saw the Doctor, Rose (Billie Piper), and Mickey (Noel Clarke) travel to an alternate dimension and come up against, for the first time in the new series, the cold, emotionless Cybermen.

The following night, Tuesday June 17th at 7:30pm local time, for no extra money at all, you can also see the premiere of Wings 3D, a documentary narrated by Tennant depicting the magic and majesty of flight as seen from the perspective of birds themselves. It’s a really glorious piece of documentary done in the typically brilliant BBC nature documentary style.

That’s right; two nights, two Tennants. You’ve probably seen those two Who episodes, but the prospect of seeing them with people on the big screen is pretty neat, I think. Plus, a 3D birds flying documentary – what more could you want?

Tickets are on sale now if you’re interested, and the event will be in 620 theaters across the country, so the odds of one being near you is quite high. Allons-y!

]]>http://nerdist.com/the-tenth-doctor-returning-to-cinemas-june-16th/feed/21David Tennant Lends His Silky Smooth Vocals To KINECT SPORTS RIVALShttp://nerdist.com/david-tennant-lends-his-silky-smooth-vocals-to-kinect-sports-rivals/
http://nerdist.com/david-tennant-lends-his-silky-smooth-vocals-to-kinect-sports-rivals/#commentsWed, 19 Mar 2014 21:45:54 +0000http://www.nerdist.com/?p=124360After many fresh pairs of Chuck Taylors and a couple of “I don’t want to go” implications later, David Tennant is back in action working on… a video game? You betcha! The Tenth Doctor himself will regenerate in Kinect Sports Rivals next month as what he calls “the voice of God.”

Here’s Tennant himself on his rookie outing as a video game voice actor:

I’ll be the first to admit that I was barely interested in this game before finding out about Tennant’s role in it. You have to give Microsoft credit for their crafty use of provocative voice work in their products — their recent implementation of Cortana into Windows Phone 8.1 has made quite the buzz across the web. And if anything could sell a lightly-marketed Kinect 2.0 game, it’d have to be Gallifrey’s own, right? Good move, Microsoft!

]]>http://nerdist.com/david-tennant-lends-his-silky-smooth-vocals-to-kinect-sports-rivals/feed/2First Two DOCTOR WHO Titan Comics Covershttp://nerdist.com/first-two-doctor-who-titan-comics-covers/
http://nerdist.com/first-two-doctor-who-titan-comics-covers/#commentsFri, 28 Feb 2014 19:45:10 +0000http://www.nerdist.com/?p=118742As we reported alllll the way back in January, Doctor Who in comic form was moving from IDW to the much smaller Titan Comics. Now, we have a glimpse at the first two covers for the first two issues of the upcoming series of series, depicting the adventures of the various Doctors. Both covers were done by artist Alice X. Zhang. Have a gander!

The Eleventh Doctor ongoing series will be written by Al Ewing and Rob Williams with art by Simon Fraser, while the Tenth Doctor ongoing series will be written by Nick Abadzis and drawn by Elena Casagrande. Both are set to hit store shelves in July.

Can you believe it?! Two ongoing Doctor Who series featuring two of the most popular and awesome Doctors? And how about those covers, huh? Titan seems to be starting with a bang, and we’ll let you know as soon as any other tantalizing morsels get released.

]]>http://nerdist.com/first-two-doctor-who-titan-comics-covers/feed/1Day of the Doctor Pre-Show and Post-Show Videoshttp://nerdist.com/join-us-for-a-doctor-who-pre-show-on-nov-23rd/
http://nerdist.com/join-us-for-a-doctor-who-pre-show-on-nov-23rd/#commentsMon, 25 Nov 2013 15:20:54 +0000http://www.nerdist.com/?p=97933You watched the Doctor Who 50th Anniversary Special, but did you catch the BBC America/Nerdist pre-show and post-show hosted by our pal Veronica Belmont, streamed live from L.A.’s YouTube space? If you missed ’em, we have them right here for you, right now.

The pre-show, with Phil DeFranco, Grant Imahara, and Noelene Clark:

The post-show wrap-up, with the same folks:

Even if you saw the shows when they initially streamed, it’s a fun way to relive the 50th….

]]>http://nerdist.com/join-us-for-a-doctor-who-pre-show-on-nov-23rd/feed/15DOCTOR WHO: A Companion’s Companion – Series 4 and Specialshttp://nerdist.com/doctor-who-a-companions-companion-series-4-and-specials/
http://nerdist.com/doctor-who-a-companions-companion-series-4-and-specials/#commentsFri, 15 Nov 2013 21:00:01 +0000http://www.nerdist.com/?p=97864After being out of the works for over a decade, Doctor Who now had three seasons of new episodes under its belt, thanks to showrunner Russell T. Davies and crew, and his then-current star, David Tennant, was two years into a highly popular TEN-ure. (I’m sorry; I’m so, so sorry.) For his third and final full series, the Tenth Doctor would be paired with a familiar face, and one that is often cited as the favorite companion. Unfortunately, for my money, she’s saddled with probably the worst story writing, a mix of boring and lame. It does contain four of my favorite episodes, though. Too bad we don’t start with that one.

Voyage of the Damned was the 2007 Christmas special, and easily the worst of the RTD era. If you’ll recall, the TARDIS gets a Titanic in it at the end of the previous series, but that doesn’t last too long. After some quick maneuvering, the Doctor separates and then finds himself aboard the spaceship Titanic, a cruise ship with rich people on it. A bunch of them go down to Earth and pretend to know about Earth culture. Then, the guy who owns the ship tries to crash it into Earth to collect insurance money and the Doctor has to stop it. It’s like The Poseidon Adventure but in space, get it? Lots of people die, get it? Kylie Minogue is in it and dies too, get it? It’s a terrible episode, get it?

Series 4 – 5 April 2008 – 5 July 2008

Now, for this series, Catherine Tate was brought back to play Donna Noble, the pseudo-companion in the 2006 Christmas special, “The Runaway Bride.” She’s brilliant and her story arc is really beautiful, about her becoming the Doctor’s friend and never wanting to stop traveling with him and growing as a person from shallow and abrasive to compassionate and heroic. This all works amazingly well, it just happens to happen through a season with way more thuds than booms.

We begin with Partners in Crime, in which the Doctor and Donna both independently investigate a diet pill that makes people’s fat literally fall off. It falls off and congeals into adorable little creatures called Adipose, and eventually people die from all the fat that they lose. The Doctor and Donna re-find each other and battle the woman behind it all. We see Donna is much more introspective than she was in the Christmas special, and spends time looking at the stars with her granddad Wilfred Mott (Bernard Cribbins), who is lovely. Silly, this story is, though. It’s very, very silly.

At least this is followed up with Fires of Pompeii, which actually features both Karen Gillan, who’d go on to play Amy Pond, and Peter Capaldi, who is forthcoming as the Twelfth Doctor. The Doctor takes Donna back to Ancient Rome, or at least he thinks it’s Ancient Rome; it’s actually Pompeii on the eve of Mt. Vesuvius erupting. It turns out that the eruption is necessary to stop evil magma aliens called Pyroviles from converting humans into molten whatevers to rebuild their lost home world.

This is an excellent example of the “fixed point in time” situations. The Doctor, in righting the timeline, actually ensures that Vesuvius will erupt and therefore kill tens of thousands of people (though I learned recently on QI that most Pompeiians got away before the volcano went boom). Donna has a hard time believing this, and says they have to do something. She convinces him, tearfully, to help one family, just one. Which he does. This sets up right away the importance of the Doctor having someone to question him and keep him humane, and that Donna isn’t just a shrill and loud person but that she’s very deep as well. Love this one.

Unfortunately, now we get 5 straight middling episodes, which are fine, I guess, but really nothing special. First is Planet of the Ood. Guess where they end up? That’s right, the planet of the Ood. After being creepy in Series 2, the Ood are back to again be creepy, but this time be more than just servants who go bad. I’m not sure why RTD loved the damned Ood so much, other than the fact that he created them. Shrug.

Next, it’s the two-parter that brought back the Sontarans, who are a great alien in theory but have only really been used well one and a half times. The Sontaran Stratagem/The Poison Sky surmises that the short war potatoes need help from an annoying and wealthy boy genius to poison the entirety of Earth through apparently court-mandated car air conditioners. What have we learned from Doctor Who, people? If something is done by everyone on Earth, it’s probably part of an alien invasion. UNIT is back for this, so that’s cool. And Martha works for UNIT now. Wait, why does she work for UNIT? And why is she back already? Shrug.

Martha goes along with the Doctor and Donna for the next episode, The Doctor’s Daughter, which is very stupid. They happen upon a war going on for “generations” in a hallway between half-cloned humans and fish aliens the Hath. The Doctor is half-cloned right away and a fully-grown blonde girl, eventually named “Jenny” (Georgia Moffett), is the Doctor’s sort-of daughter. Because Jenny got away at the end, a bunch of people STILL keep holding out hope that she’s going to come back. She won’t. In real life, Georgia Moffett is the daughter of Fifth Doctor Peter Davison, so she is in fact the Doctor’s daughter. She’s also married to David Tennant, making her also the Doctor’s wife. Gross.

And the final middling ep is actually okay, if you look past how goofy it is (or if you like how goofy it is). The Unicorn and the Wasp is an Agatha Christie mystery that actually has a young Agatha Christie in it. There’s a person who is an alien wasp that’s killing people in a large manner house in the 1926. This is undoubtedly a fun episode, and of any of the aforementioned middling ones, I like this one the best. It’s a bit of lightness before the next few, which are heeeeeeeavy, boy.

Steven Moffat’s two-parter Silence in the Library/Forest of the Dead is very interesting, and we find out later, very important to the future of the story. The Doctor and Donna head to a planet that is entirely a library and it houses every bit of knowledge ever. They’re surprised to find, though, that the library is entirely devoid of people. Soon, there is an expedition that arrives with people in spacesuits, believing the air to be toxic. They’re looking for evidence of what might have happened. Among this expedition is Professor River Song (Alex Kingston) who apparently knows the Doctor but has never seen him “so young” before. She knows him in his future. Scary, I know. Even scarier is that the library is all infested with a shadow insect race, or whatever, called the Vashta Nerada which live in the darkness and, like piranha, can devour people in seconds, leaving only their date-recorder to speak for them. “Hey, who turned out the lights?”

The library’s computer system is alive, and inside its matrix, it thinks it’s a little girl. Donna gets “saved” before she is eaten by the Vashta and ends up inside the matrix, thinking she’s married and has children, living a whole life, in fact. This can’t last forever, though, and River Song sacrifices herself to save the Doctor as he tries to destroy the shadow monsters and retrieve his friend from the computer. Even though she appears to have died, River is saved and the Doctor races to implant her essence inside the matrix where she takes care of Donna’s fake kids and hangs out with all her dead-but-saved expedition friends.

I liked these episodes okay at the time, but I LOVE them now in retrospect, now that we know what we know about River Song and her timeline. While the whole of her life isn’t as interesting as it started in our view of things, this ending is satisfying both backward and forward in the chronology. Plus, it’s nice to see her with Tennant just once, seeing as she’d spend so much of her time with Smith thereafter.

After those, we have my favorite episode of the year, and actually one of my top 5 new Who stories ever: Midnight. On the planet Midnight for rest and relaxation, the Doctor is restless and leaves Donna by the pool to go see the strange sapphire fjords or whatever the hell on a tour transport. It takes a couple of hours to get there, and the small group of passengers don’t really seem to want to chat, but the Doctor forces them to by messing with the entertainment system. Unfortunately, the transport soon finds itself infiltrated, perhaps, by an unseen entity. It gets into one passenger (Lesley Sharp), and she begins repeating things people say, mostly the Doctor because he talks the most. Soon, though, she’s saying things at the same time as him and the other passengers start freaking out even more than before. They start to turn on the Doctor and do so even more when, somehow, the alien starts saying things BEFORE the Doctor, who seems incapable of not saying the thing. The passengers all assume he’s the alien now, but can he convince them otherwise?

I just adore this as a piece of stand-alone storytelling. Written out of necessity, the whole thing more or less takes place in one windowless space, the transport, and all of the drama is done with the cast, who are all excellent. (Among the guest cast is David Troughton, son of Patrick, and Colin Morgan, who’d go on to play the eponymous character in Merlin.) This is some of Tennant’s best work in the whole of his tenure, and it’s such a bleak, dark story with troubling themes and unexplained motivations. Even for an RTD episode, this is some dark stuff.

That was the companion-lite episode, so what of the Doctor-lite one? That would be Turn Left, which a lot of people absolutely love, but I’ll tell you this: I don’t like it. It’s not that there isn’t terrific acting in it from Tate, Cribbins, and Jacqueline King as Donna’s mom. All of them are wonderful, no question. It’s that it’s a “what-if?” storyline which takes place because Donna has a hallucinogenic spider on her back (?) and it causes her to make one decision differently before she ever met the Doctor and her whole life changed. The Doctor dies, Torchwood is destroyed, all sorts of bad things happen, and the people in England have to cram into tiny abodes and live on rations and things. Then Rose Tyler, who’s been popping up periodically this season, shows up to remind Donna of what was supposed to happen and then they try to make it so.

Here’s my problem with “what if?” storylines: Who gives a shit? They aren’t real. They have no bearing on the future. It’s not like anything that happens in “Turn Left” really has much impact on the proceedings and it all goes back to one at the end. I’ve heard arguments that it’s important to show that Donna is important and that even someone as seemingly meaningless as a temp from Cheswick can make a difference. Okay, we knew that already. Donna’s been proving that all series long. So, again I ask – Who cares? It’s a wasted episode if you ask me, and no amount of arguing has made me change my mind.

And we end the series on what is (or should have been) the most epic two-parter ever: The Stolen Earth/Journey’s End. It sees the return of everybody. That’s right; everybody. Rose, Jackie, Mickey, Martha, Captain Jack, his Torchwood crew (the living ones), Sarah Jane, hell, even Harriet Jones, former Prime Minister, pops up to stop the Daleks’ plot to pull various planets out of their orbit (including Earth) to create a mechanism of some sort in space. It’s Davros’ fault. Oh yeah, Davros is in this, too. At the end of the first episode, the Doctor is reunited with Rose, or would be if he didn’t get grazed in the chest by a Dalek blast. He tries to stop it, but he starts regenerating… Oh no…

What a CLIFFHANGER! Is David Tennant really regenerating? Did they hide it that well? Oh no! No, it’s a cop out, fuckers. He instead, like a dick, siphons off his regenerative energy into his own severed hand, which Captain Jack had in Torchwood and brought back with him. So, he can stay the Tenth Doctor for a while longer. Umm… okay.

The problem, though, is that Donna, who feels like she has nothing to contribute to the death of everybody, touches the hand and infuses some of the Time Lord energy into herself and some of her humanity into the hand. The hang grows into another Tenth Doctor, this one human, and Donna gets to be all smart and Doctor-y. She’s the “Doctor-Donna.” She ends up saving everybody’s life and stopping the Daleks. Everybody goes back where they belong and the Doctor leaves Handy Doctor with Rose, because why shouldn’t she have everything she ever wanted like she’s the most important human who ever lived or whatever? Unfortunately, Donna can’t sustain being part Time Lord, and so the Doctor has to take her brain back to where it was before he met her, meaning she’s back to being a shallow and abrasive person with no memory of the Doctor.

This ending is the saddest companion departure maybe ever. It’s so good and sad that it almost makes up for the complete load of TRIPE the rest of the episode is. Come ON! The Daleks invented a “Reality Bomb.” Rose came back… why the hell does Rose keep being important?!?! Just because she was the first companion doesn’t mean she’s like the Doctor’s all-time greatest got-away love. Gag me with a spoon, people. The Handy Doctor is sure convenient, isn’t it? This is RTD having his cake and eating it, too. UGH. But, I will say this: it’s a hell of a lot better than David Tennant’s actual final story.

Specials – 25 December 2008 – 1 January 2010

When it was announced that RTD and Tennant were leaving, it was then announced that Steven Moffat would be stepping in as showrunner. They decided to give him a year to get his ducks in a row, and so a full calendar year-and-a-bit consisting only of five specials was devised, one on Christmas 2008, one on Easter 2009, one in the middle of November 2009, and a two-parter for Christmas Day and New Year’s Day 2009-2010. One of these is good, one of is okay, and the others are crapola.

The okay one is The Next Doctor, an evocative title in which the Doctor goes back to Victorian England at Christmastime and encounters Cybermen, Cyber Shades (which are like cyber-ish ape-dog things), and someone claiming to be the Doctor (David Morrissey) but with no memory of any of the other lives he had. He’s got a sonic screwdriver (which isn’t sonic), a companion, and a TARDIS (which is a hot air balloon). But, he’s actually a guy named Jackson Lake who just thinks he’s the Doctor. There’s a giant, Godzilla-sized Cyber Controller in this story too, which is actually complete crap. Why did I think this one was okay? Cuz of David Morrissey? Okay.

Second, it’s Planet of the Dead, in which the Doctor gets on a double-decker bus on Easter which goes through a wormhole and ends up on a desert planet on which flying shark things exist and they want to devour things whole, so them coming through the wormhole to London would be a bad thing. On the bus is jewel thief Lady Cristina de Souza (Michelle Ryan), who in any other case WOULD have been the next companion, but we’re to believe the Doctor is sad and alone and doesn’t want to face his future, in which his time ends and four knocks will usher his death. This is a pretty dumb story.

In November, we get the one that’s actually brilliant, The Waters of Mars. The Doctor goes to Mars for fun and comes across the first human settlement. He knows everybody there from the history books and is so excited, except he figures out that he’s arrived just as the crew all are supposed to die, at the hands of liquid aliens which infect and zombify them. He tries to ignore the fact that he wants to save them, but eventually he gives in in a big bad way. He decides he isn’t just going to play time’s game. He’s the Time Lord Victorious; he didn’t just survive the Time War, he won it. Why shouldn’t he save people who are meant to die, even if it means positive things that happen from their deaths don’t happen? When Adelaide Brooke (Lindsay Duncan) refuses to let the Doctor win, she kills herself, ensuring her own daughter will know greatness. That’s hella dark, you guys. The Doctor seems ready to face his fate now, doesn’t he?

Welllllll, no. Instead, he minces about for two more episodes and acts like a spoiled brat and not the hero we’ve all come to know and love. In The End of Time, Parts 1 & 2, the Master (John Simm) is reawakened via potions, is unstable, tries to make himself every human on Earth, and brings back the Time Lords, who want to use the Earth as their new Gallifrey, before eventually helping the Doctor defeat Rassilon (Timothy Dalton).

The Doctor, meanwhile, doesn’t want to die, and tells Wilf that he’s scared to become a new man, even though we’ve always known the Doctor remains, the same man just changes. It’s a moment few Doctors have, the fear of not being around anymore, and I’ll grant the Tenth Doctor this, because it’s a nice scene. However. By the end of the episode, he hasn’t heard the four knocks, but when he does it’s because Wilf is trapped in a room that will soon fill with radioactivity. The Doctor gets ANGRY at Wilf and the fact that he has to save him, and thus sacrifice himself. Wilf, because he’s a saint, even tells the Doctor to let him die (!), because the Doctor is more important than he is. But no, the Doctor does save Wilf and absorbs the radiation and begins literally the longest “I’m gonna regenerate soon” period any Doctor ever has.

He goes and does one more good deed, no matter how silly, for all of his past friends and companions. He saves Martha and Mickey, who are married for some reason, from a Sontaran. He sets Captain Jack up with the midshipman from “Voyage of the Damned,” he saves Sarah Jane’s son, Luke, from being hit by a car, hell he even visits the great granddaughter of Nurse Redfern, whose name is Verity Newman. He gets Donna’s father in the past to buy a winning lottery ticket to give to Donna on her wedding day. Then he goes and sees Rose just a couple of weeks before she’ll eventually meet the Ninth Doctor. He sees EVERYBODY and says goodbye to ALL of them. He should be satisfied. But what does he say? With tears in his eyes, like a child, says “I don’t want to go,” making the Tenth Doctor’s regeneration the least satisfying thing in the history of anything.

Seriously, my anger at this ending cannot properly be quantified. Why would he STILL not want to go? Fucking man up, Doctor. Yes, maybe it is unfair, but you’re the goddamned Doctor. The Fifth Doctor saved one person and it caused him to regenerate. The Third Doctor faced his fears, thus leading to his death. The Tenth Doctor whined like a baby and made an old man concede to his own death. I adored the Tenth Doctor up until the end of Series 4 and then Russell T. Davies just started making him a knob. And worse than that, an unheroic knob. Heroes don’t cry because they got an extra 30 years to say goodbye to everybody. GAH.

Anyway, after this incredibly overblown and melodramatic finale, which was much more about RTD leaving than about Tennant leaving, Matt Smith shows up and is weird and kooky and exciting and definitely not whiny. I couldn’t wait for the Smith/Moffat era to begin, and because it premiered in April, I didn’t have to wait long. And because I’ll write another one of these for Monday, neither will you.

]]>http://nerdist.com/doctor-who-a-companions-companion-series-4-and-specials/feed/14DOCTOR WHO: A Companion’s Companion – Series 3http://nerdist.com/doctor-who-a-companions-companion-series-3/
http://nerdist.com/doctor-who-a-companions-companion-series-3/#commentsWed, 13 Nov 2013 23:00:16 +0000http://www.nerdist.com/?p=97512David Tennant’s first series proved that the new audience would willingly and happily go along with a new Doctor, but would they be as equally able to go along with a new companion? Since the rebirth of the show in 2005, the audience had gotten to know Rose Tyler and her family, but after the devastating finale to Series 2, in which all of them are trapped “forever” in a parallel dimension, the only person the audience would have to side with is the Doctor himself. His first “solo” adventure would be at Christmas, when he would meet a future companion. Of course, nobody knew at the time she’d be a future companion, but there you go.

Runaway Bride picks up from the cliffhanger of Series 2, in which the Doctor suddenly had an angry bride in the TARDIS. That bride turned out to be Donna Noble (Catherine Tate), who somehow ended up there via some higgledy-piggledy. She, being Donna, is irritated and angry that this man should have abducted her, and the Doctor takes her back to London, only for her to be abducted by a taxi driven by robo-Santas, like the year before. He manages to chase the car down in the TARDIS and retrieves her, but the TARDIS is zapped and needs to rest.

Turns out Donna had been consistently dosed with huon particles (which caused the robo-Santas to chase her) by her fiancé, who’s an asshole. He’s been working with the Empress of the Racnoss, a spider-centaur species long thought destroyed by the Time Lords. The huon-particle-infused Donna is meant to be the key to unlocking the Empress’ children. Obviously, this is a bad thing. After a lot more larking about, the Doctor offers to transport the Empress and her children to a world where they would do no harm to anyone, but she refuses, leaving the Doctor no alternative than to destroy her by flooding her pit with the Thames. He almost allows himself to drown with her, but Donna convinces him that they should leave. She declines his invitation to travel with him, but tells him he ought to find someone.

This is a really nice special, but is not particularly Christmassy at all, despite the robot Santa Clauses. First of all, who would choose to get married on Christmas? I don’t care how much you like the holiday, you pick a different damn day. Anyway, I was not a big fan of Donna in this special, but that’s because she wasn’t meant to be anything more than a guest star, and as such could be a bit of a jerk and it wouldn’t be a problem. You do sort of feel bad for her, because her family isn’t very nice to her. Anyway, it’s a pretty good special, and it shows us the first little glimpse of the darkness inside the Tenth Doctor.

Series 3 – 31 March 2007 – 30 June 2007

I alluded to this in my last post and I’ll sure as heck reiterate it now: Series 3 is my favorite Tennant series. I think the writing is uniformly pretty great and, unlike his other two series which are much more hit and miss, Series 3, for me, only has three and a half terrible episodes. Granted, one of and a half of those are the finale, but that’s a really good batting average. It’s got four episodes that are downright classics and five and a half that run the gamut from “quite good” to “pretty good.” That’s kind of all I want from Doctor Who: Don’t bore me or insult my intelligence, and, for me, this series does it the best.

In the premiere, Smith and Jones, we’re introduced to the new companion, medical student Martha Jones (Freema Agyeman), whose family tends not to get along very well. They’re much less engaging than Rose’s fam, it has to be said, but at least they don’t factor in too much. While on her rounds, she comes across the Doctor, who has checked himself into the hospital under the name John Smith. Not long after this, the hospital is taken to the moon. Yep, just like that. It’s been taken by the intergalactic police force, the Judoon, who are big rhino-headed dudes. They’re looking for a fugitive plasmavore who is hiding herself from detection by sucking the blood of humans. But, if she sucks the blood of a Time Lord, maybe the Judoon won’t be fooled.

This episode is a lot of fun, and a really great way to introduce a new companion. Unlike previously, the Doctor doesn’t really want to take her with him and only offers her one trip. He’s still caught up on Rose. This is the main thing that I dislike about this series: Martha’s puppy-dog love for the Doctor and his rather callous ignorance to it. In fact, his pining for Rose would become the staple through the entirety of the Tenth Doctor’s tenure. Fucking get over it already.

Anyway, Martha’s first trip is back to Elizabethan London to see Shakespeare’s Love’s Labours Lost in The Shakespeare Code, written by Gareth Roberts. This is a really enjoyable episode to me, even if a lot of the actual history isn’t correct. Who gives a poop? It’s a show with a guy in a blue box and a sonic screwdriver. I love the way it uses Shakespeare’s own “mythology” and incorporates an alien element, as well as the power of words.

Next, we go back to New New York for Gridlock, an episode in which people in the future are stuck in the many-stories-high traffic jam on their way into the sunlight. People are forced to live in their cars, and some people have only ever been in a car. Very creepy. If they go too far down, they’re in danger of being gobbled up by a mutated cousin of the Macra (from “The Macra Terror”). We get the return of the Cat People and the third and final appearance of The Face of Boe, who tells the Doctor he isn’t alone. This is the very first episode in which the Doctor vocalizes what happened to him and his people and at last says the name of his former planet, Gallifrey.

After three quite enjoyable episodes, we have two of the worst in the history of the show, I think – Daleks in Manhattan/Evolution of the Daleks by Helen Raynor. What utter dross. The Doctor and Martha go back to Depression-era New York City, where the Cult of Skaro, the last remaining Daleks after the Battle of Canary Wharf, have set up shop and are experimenting on people, turning a perfectly nice guy into a pig man. What they’re actually trying to do is hybridize Dalek and human DNA to create – get ready – a Human-Dalek. Wooooooooow. Despite the appearance of a young(er) Andrew Garfield, this two-parter is always one I skip when watching the DVDs. Couldn’t we have had ONE year when the Daleks weren’t involved?

We follow this crap with two episodes that are perfectly decent but really nothing special, aside from a couple of moments. First, it’s The Lazarus Experiment by Stephen Greenhorn (who?), in which Mr. Saxon, the mysterious Prime Minister candidate, has funded the aged Professor Lazarus’ (Mark Gatiss) research into becoming young again. He performs the procedure on himself for a high society party, which the Doctor and Martha also attend, and he does, indeed, become a young man again. This doesn’t last too long, and he soon begins to mutate into a giant crab creature thing. The usual. At the end of the episode, Martha yells at the Doctor and says that if she’s going to continue traveling with him, she has to be more than a passenger. A very good moment for Martha.

Next, they end up aboard a spaceship bound a star in Chris Chibnall’s 42, a deliberate reference to the TV show 24, only here they have 42 minutes to solve the problem instead of 24 hours. However, the “real-time” nature of this is pretty feeble. One of the crew of this ship gets infected by something which causes his temperature to rise astronomically; He begins stalking and burning other people. The Doctor only has a short time to get the ship righted before it goes careening into the star, but that’s difficult when Martha is stuck aboard a drifting escape pod and he himself is fighting off star infection. The star, we find out, is actually a living being that wants to absorb them all. What a jerk. I think this episode is just fine, and certainly not worth the ire it usually draws, generally due to its writer, who was in charge of the Torchwood spinoff during its horrible first series.

All right, so three good eps, two terrible ones, and two more okay ones have led to this: four straight episodes that are frigging great. We begin with Paul Cornell’s Human Nature/Family of Blood, in which the Doctor is being chased by the Family of Blood, an evil alien clan who will stop at nothing to get the Time Lord’s secrets. In order to combat this, he places his Time Lordy essence in a fob watch, making him a human with none of the Doctor’s attributes, and he and Martha go back to 1913 England to hide. “John Smith” becomes a teacher at a boy’s school and Martha becomes a maid, but also the secret guardian of the watch and the Doctor’s true nature. John Smith is not brave, nor bold, but is very kind and generous and falls in love with Nurse Joan Redfern (Jessica Hynes, nee Stevenson). This can’t last forever, though, as the Family arrives and begins taking over members of the small community on the eve of World War I. Martha needs to release the Doctor, but someone, a psychic student named Latimer, has taken the fob watch.

I just categorically adore this story, and I think it’s David Tennant’s best work in the whole program, which is a bit of a weird thing to say considering he’s barely the Doctor in it. I love that it calls into question the morality of the Doctor and whether or not a regular person, if faced with the opportunity to become a galactic hero, would choose to forsake a human life. In truth, there’s very little heroic about the Doctor at times, especially when he brings such wanton death with him wherever he goes. One can sympathize with Miss Redfern’s utter disgust at him and his whole existence, especially because it means the man she’d come to love is no more but someone else with his face walking around. Heartbreaking, really.

And, yes, let’s acknowledge the fact that this is the first new episode to show pictures of the old Doctors, and gives a prominent spot to Paul McGann, who Russell T. Davies himself slagged off in an episode of Queer As Folk.

This is followed by what is often considered the best episode of new Who in existence, Blink, written by Steven Moffat. This is a Doctor-lite episode, focusing on the excellent non-companion Sally Sparrow (Carey Mulligan), but it introduces us to so many things that would show up later, such as the Weeping Angels and the persistence of the term “Timey-Wimey.” This episode is really terrific with its use of causal loops and time travel paradoxes, which Moffat apparently loves and would use again when he took over as head writer. What more can I say? It’s a frigging great episode. Everybody loves it.

The first episode of the three-episode finale (kind of) is Utopia which has the Doctor stop off in Cardiff to fill up the TARDIS with rift energy. At the end of the first series of Torchwood, Captain Jack Harkness (John Barrowman) hears the TARDIS and comes a-running, and here we see him go a-runnin’. He jumps on the TARDIS as it takes off and rides the time vortex to the ship’s finale destination, the very, very end of the universe with the last vestiges of humanity huddled together in a rocket silo while tattooed mutants lurk outside. The TARDIS went here to try to get away from Jack, who is literally removed from time. After the events of “The Parting of the Ways,” in which Bad Wolf Rose brings Jack back from the dead, he is now immortal; more accurately, he dies all the time, but he reconstitutes himself each time and comes back to life. He chased down the Doctor to figure out why. The Doctor doesn’t really like this.

Elsewhere in the compound, the kindly Professor Yana (Sir Derek Jacobi) and his nice but verbally irritating assistant Chan Tho are trying to make it so the rocket can take the surviving humans to “Utopia,” the place they’ve wanted to go forever. Yana’s never had much luck until the Doctor arrives and helps, but now they’ve got a time crunch, because the mutants will get in soon. In the professor’s lab, Martha sees a fob watch, not unlike the Doctor’s, and wonders what it could mean. Unfortunately, it means that Yana is actually the human version of his old nemesis, the Master, who hid himself away during the Time War. You know, like a coward.

The Master steals the TARDIS, but not before he’s shot by a dying Chan Tho and the Doctor is able to make it so the ship can only travel between the place it left and the place it was going, meaning either the end of the universe and present-day UK. The Master regenerates into John Simm. Luckily, the Doctor, Jack, and Martha are able to travel the present with the use of Jack’s vortex manipulator wristband. When they arrive, they see a country controlled by Harold Saxon, who is, of course, the Master.

This begins the second episode, The Sound of Drums, in which the three heroes attempt to stop the Master as he and his human wife (who is crazy) kill members of the cabinet and start taking over the world. Most of this episode is great, especially the phone conversations between the Doctor and Master. Simm’s Master is very manic and sort of Joker-ish, which isn’t really the character, but works opposite Tennant (here, anyway). They talk about how the Master has always heard a distant drumming ever since he looked into the time vortex as a child and it has driven him mad.

Where this episode falls apart is when the Master takes control of UNIT’s flying airship and kills the “President Elect” (who should be nowhere near any kind of military outfit yet… he’s not the President yet, duh!). He captures everybody and zaps the Doctor with his laser screwdriver, which apparently has the ability to turn him old. I mean, I guess. Jack is tied up and continually tortured, and Martha’s family are made to be servants to Saxon. Martha somehow escapes, and for the next YEAR goes around the globe creating a resistance to Saxon’s dominion.

In the final episode, Last of the Time Lords, which is just crap, the Master zaps the Doctor, further turning him into a stupid tiny Dobby-like version of himself, which again doesn’t make any sense. His big evil scheme is to bring an army of Toclaphane (spherical creatures of Time Lord myth) to be his evil murder corps. Turns out, inside the Toclaphane are the heads of all the people from the end of the universe, and he’s using a thing that I swear is called a PARADOX MACHINE that allows them to go back in time and kill their ancestors without succumbing to the grandfather paradox.

It’s completely ridiculous, but not even as ridiculous as the eventual end of the story, in which somehow, the people thinking the Doctor’s name in unison will bring him back to normal, in a Christ-like pose as well. Huh? Da fuh? The Doctor offers to take the Master with him, becoming a prisoner aboard the TARDIS, because they’re the last two of their kind, and used to be old friends. Unfortunately, Lucy Saxon shoots the Master, and he defiantly refuses to regenerate. He is buried, but someone retrieves his ring, which will lead to the most stupid episode in Tennant’s whole reign. More on that later.

The timeline is set back to normal and only the people aboard the airship remember anything about the year in which the Master controlled the world. It’s also hinted at that Jack might have been the Face of Boe. The Doctor offers to let him keep traveling, but Jack decides to stay with Torchwood. Martha also decides that she’s had enough and goes back to her normal life. The episode ends with the Titanic crashing through the TARDIS. Oh boy.

Series 3 ends on a pretty dumb note, but, as I said before, it’s got some great stuff otherwise. Most people prefer 2 or 4, mostly for the companion, but I think Series 3 represents the best writing of the RTD era and the most consistent. Plus, even if he ends up being poo, I’m a big enough Pertwee fan to be excited whenever the Master’s about. Most of the time. Next time, it’s all happening, as I talk about Series 4 and the gap-year specials.

]]>http://nerdist.com/doctor-who-a-companions-companion-series-3/feed/8DOCTOR WHO: A Companion’s Companion – Series 2http://nerdist.com/doctor-who-a-companions-companion-series-2/
http://nerdist.com/doctor-who-a-companions-companion-series-2/#commentsTue, 12 Nov 2013 00:00:16 +0000http://www.nerdist.com/?p=97163Doctor Who comes back to television screens for the first time in essentially 16 years and for 13 weeks, it’s a hit again. Then, BOOM! The lead actor turns into a different guy at the end. Whether or not people were pleased about Christopher Eccleston leaving and David Tennant taking his place, the change forced new viewers to deal with the idea of regeneration right away. And, lucky for viewers, there was a chance to get used to this new weirdo with admittedly excellent hair in the form of a Christmas special, which would become a staple of Doctor Who since the return. Some are Christmassier than others, but few have as much to do narratively than The Christmas Invasion.

Making a crash-landing back at Rose’s homestead, the new Doctor falls out of the TARDIS and passes out. He’s going through a regenerative crisis, which is pretty common, and needs to go to Jackie Tyler’s flat to recuperate. Rose is understandably upset by just having seen her friend turn into another person. Santa robots and evil Christmas trees attack them, and the Doctor springs back to wakefulness to ward them off. He’s still not out of the woods, though, and his constant exhaling of regenerative energy is attracting all kinds of baddies, including the Sycorax, who now want the Earth to surrender.

To ensure their victory, the Sycorax hypnotize everyone on the planet with Type A blood and they all stand somewhere dangerous so that if Earth does not concede, all of the people will jump to their doom. The new Prime Minister, Harriet Jones (Prime Minister), recruits Rose to help, but the Doctor is still out of commission. Eventually, the Doctor does wake up and face the Sycorax leader in a sword fight, wherein he gets his hand cut off (VERY IMPORTANT FOR LATER) but he regrows it thanks to his regenerative state. Anyway, he gets them to leave, but Harriet Jones (Prime Minister) gets Torchwood to fire on them as they’re leaving, and they’re destroyed. The Doctor is unhappy about this.

In many ways, “The Christmas Invasion” is more important than any of the previous episodes because it has to introduce people to the first new Doctor of the new series. In much the same way that if Patrick Troughton hadn’t been accepted, the show might not have lasted, if Tennant had not been accepted, we wouldn’t still be talking about Doctor Who. It’s also a gamble in that we don’t get to see too much of the Tenth Doctor because he’s in a coma, but Rose is the audience surrogate anyway, so it’s all right. I think some of Tennant’s dialogue during his reemergence from the TARDIS is a bit hokey (especially the Lion King bit), but you can’t argue that he didn’t have charisma right away.

It was four months before audiences were able to see the Tenth Doctor for anything more than this fleeting instance, but in April of 2006, the proper Series 2 began.

Series 2 – 15 April 2006 – 8 July 2006

Now, a lot of people love Series 2, mainly for the relationship growth between the Tenth Doctor and Rose. Many even lay the initials “OTP” on them, which I can only imagine means Ontological Train Platform. While I generally don’t have a problem with the idea of the Doctor being a romantic or even sexual being, I always feel like he’s just beyond it and doesn’t really care one way or the other. As such, I’m not a particular fan of Series 2, because I never really bought Tennant and Piper together. She was much better with Eccleston, I thought. Anyway, I know that’s not a popular belief, but it’s my belief nonetheless.

As far as episodes go, I think Series 2 only has about 5 really terrific ones, a few that are fine, and a couple that are very dumb. And yet, for some people, it’s their favorite Tennant year. I mean, it’s fine.

We start with New Earth, in which the Doctor takes Rose to a completely different planet, which is a brand new concept for the new series. In all of Series 1, the Doctor only took Rose backwards and forwards in time on or around the planet Earth. Here, though, they get to go to a planet that isn’t Earth, but is called New Earth. Step in the right direction, I guess. This episode sees the return of The Face of Boe and Lady Cassandra from “The End of the World,” and the first appearance of cat nurses. There are decent elements to this one, and the Doctor is pretty great, but I can’t stand all the body-switching stuff with Cassandra’s brain in Rose and the Doctor. Dumb.

Next, they pair go back in time to Victorian Scotland for Tooth and Claw, an episode that bravely claims that the royal family are all werewolves. That’s a pretty cool idea. The whole thing about lycanthropy being somehow linked to alien something or other has never made sense to me, nor has the idea of a cult of wolf-worshippers. The action is pretty good, though, as is the CGI werewolf which looks a lot better than it might. However, I think Rose is really irritating in this episode. Also, in this episode, we see the beginning of Torchwood, which was created by Queen Victoria as a means of keeping the British Empire safe from alien invaders.

The third episode is where we finally get an episode that I like more or less without reservation, School Reunion, written by Toby Whithouse. In it, the Doctor and Rose go undercover at a school to investigate weird activity at the behest of Mickey Smith. The Doctor is pretending to be a science teacher and Rose a cafeteria worker, much to her chagrin. The Doctor notes how well behaved the children are and how abnormally intelligent. Someone else is curious about the school and comes to check it out, that being a journalist named Sarah Jane Smith (Elisabeth Sladen). The Doctor is pleased to see his old companion, but, since she doesn’t recognize him, he keeps up the ruse of him being John Smith. This is all for naught when she discovers the TARDIS and realizes what’s going on.

She’s also brought K-9 with her, continuing on from the failed pilot for K-9 and Company from back in the early ’80s. Rose and Sarah Jane immediately form a rivalry, each thinking they were “special” in the Doctor’s travels, but really they’re just one of dozens. However, soon they start laughing at the Doctor for being so goofy. It happens. The headmaster at the school (Anthony Stewart Head) is actually a Krillitane, a species that absorbs and adapts from other species into its own, and he’s been smartening up the student body for use in their evil, computer-based plans. The headmaster tries to get the Doctor to join him, but that’s a silly idea.

The alien plot of this episode is not the most compelling, but the character interactions are all fantastic. They deal with the Doctor’s propensity to leave people behind and for picking up new people rather easily. The Doctor tells Rose that it pains him to see his companions get old when he merely changes and goes on. We also get Mickey realizing he’s the “Tin Dog” and wants to be a proper companion, which irritates Rose. And K-9 blows up, if only to be somehow rebuilt again and given back to Sarah Jane as the Doctor says goodbye, even though he does see her again.

Next up is Steven Moffat’s episode for the year, The Girl in the Fireplace, which is a fun timey-wimey adventure that works incredibly well on its own but doesn’t really fit in the context of the season, especially with Rose and her continually puppy-dog eyes for the Doctor at every other point in the series, yet here, she doesn’t really seem to mind that the Doctor cavorts with Madame du Pompadour. Regardless, the idea of a spaceship being somehow connected through time to Versailles, and, moreover, that clockwork robots think they need the organs of a famous French historical figure to fix the ship is a very interesting concept that works largely very well.

In this episode, we also get the thread that Moffat explores later during his time as showrunner of the Doctor meeting a person at various points in their life but never when he means to and always to the human’s detriment. It’s really the time traveler’s dilemma: you either take a person with you or never see them again, but popping in and out does neither party any favors. “The Girl in the Fireplace” is a great example of this, and for that I think it’s pretty tops.

After that is the series’ first two-parter, Rise of the Cybermen/The Age of Steel by Tom MacRae. The Doctor, Rose, and Mickey end up in a parallel Earth when the TARDIS slips through dimensions. In this reality, Rose’s father, Pete Tyler, is still alive and is a telecommunications magnate. He’s still married to Jackie, even though they don’t really get along, but they never had any kids. Mickey has a doppelganger here named Ricky who is part of a rebel group trying to take down authority. Pete is working with Cybus Industries, the CEO of which is trying to get the President of Great Britain to sign off on a plan to upgrade people’s brains using EarPods.

Even though the president says no, Cybus is doing it anyway, and as such has created this universe’s version of Cybermen; they begin assimilating and deleting people by the bunches. Rose talks to this universe’s Pete, but he’s less than fatherly, seeing as he never actually had a daughter to begin with. This Jackie doesn’t like Rose, but it’s fine because she becomes a Cyberman anyway. In the end, Pete helps defeat the Cybermen along with the rebels. Mickey does his part, but Ricky is killed. Mickey decides to stay and take up where his counterpart left off.

I like this two-parter because it reintroduced the Cybermen, who remain my favorite monsters on the show, and it does something sort of new with the idea of parallel dimensions. I generally think alternate universe or alternate timeline storylines are a waste of time, seeing as we know there won’t be many lasting effects in the series, but here Mickey stays behind and Rose knows that a version of her father is alive, which gives the story more gravitas and yet still the freedom of being in another reality.

This is followed by The Idiot’s Lantern, by Mark Gatiss. It’s about an alien called “The Wire” which exists in televisions sucking people’s faces off while they watch the Queen’s coronation in 1953. There’s family stuff in it that’s quite good but ultimately this episode is pretty forgettable. In fact, there’s several episodes of this series that take place in the suburbs and none of them are particularly enjoyable for me; this one is probably the most watchable. Meh.

However, two episodes that I can ALWAYS watch are The Impossible Planet/The Satan Pit, credited to Matt Jones, but really probably done by Russell T. Davies. In it, the Doctor and Rose end up on a research station in deep space on a planet that somehow is orbiting a black hole without being sucked in. There is writing scrawled around that even the TARDIS’ translation circuits can’t read. The base has servants in the form of the Ood, strange-looking, tendril-covered aliens who have an orb connected to them from which they can speak. They apparently live to serve and keep the station working properly.

The crew awakens an entity known as “The Beast” while they drill into the planet’s immensely powerful core and it infects the historian among the crew. He begins killing off members while the Doctor and a scientist go into the planet to see what is possibly the oldest thing in the universe. Anyway, long story short, the Beast takes over the Ood and they start attacking while the Doctor finds a massive creature that looks like Satan that has no mind, alluding to the fact that the Beast is no longer inside its body.

I really adore this two-parter, and it’s my favorite story of the year by a long shot. I love the ideas and how genuinely scary it is. It also introduces the Ood, which aren’t used particularly well later on, but here they’re still a very good idea, and a very effective threat. Plus, this is one of the best examples of the few times the show has tried to deal with the Devil and religious iconography. Many other stories visually pull from this one (the Doctor’s space suit especially), and it’s still the best use of them all.

Now, a lot of people seem to like Love & Monsters, the first in what became known as the “Doctor-Lite” episodes, a scheduling necessity which became a staple from here on out. This one is a first-person narrated pseudo-comedy about a guy who encountered the Doctor and who gets together with a group of people to talk about their experiences, and eventually they become friends, and a romantic relationship even blossoms between the guy and a girl in the group. However, the person who formed the group is actually an alien called an “Absorbolof” which sucks people up into itself. The monster was the product of a Blue Peter contest, by the way. I don’t dislike this episode per say, I just think it’s a bit silly and it purports that it’s okay for a guy to have a relationship with a girl who’s stuck in a pane of concrete. That ain’t okay, man.

The next episode, Fear Her by Matthew Graham, has the dubious distinction of being the only New Who episode I’ve only watched once, on my initial watch of the episodes back in 2009. It’s got something to do with a girl and a monster she created out of drawings. It’s also got to do with the London Olympics in 2012 and the Doctor, stupidly, gets to carry the torch and even light the thing. That’s literally all I remember. A lot of people thing “Fear Her” is the absolute nadir of Doctor Who, but I don’t. If it were THAT bad, I’d probably have watched it again at some point just as a cultural experiment. Instead, I nothing it. I have no reason to watch it again.

And we end the series on a high and low; high in quality and low in happy endings – Army of Ghosts/Doomsday. The Doctor and Rose return to London in the present and are fairly surprised to see that there have been ghost sightings throughout the world at various increments. The Doctor gets his handy 3D glasses out and some ghost-detecting device to try to figure it out. He and Jackie Tyler get picked up by Torchwood, which we finally find out is the clandestine alien-fighting/retrieval unit that picks up extraterrestrial technology to reverse engineer. Turns out, Torchwood is messing with the universes and is behind the ghosts. When the ghosts finally become corporeal, we see that they’re Cybermen from the parallel universe coming through.

Very bad stuff begins to happen but soon even worse stuff happens. Torchwood has a sphere which the Doctor calls a “Void Ship,” designed only to exist in the space between universes. However, when this ship opens, it’s got some damn Daleks in it. The Daleks have a device called the “Genesis ark” which can create more and more Daleks. Oh, no. Mickey and his pal Jake from the alternate dimension have come through the rift as well, using buttons around their neck which they got from their world’s Torchwood. Jake takes the Doctor to see Pete Tyler about sealing the breach before his universe is destroyed through heat.

The only way to stop the Cybermen and the Daleks (who are now fighting each other in the “Battle of Canary Wharf”) is to use Torchwood’s technology to suck them all into the void. The Doctor is able to do this, but Rose is being sucked in as well. The Doctor can’t reach her. Luckily, Pete zaps into this reality and zaps Rose out of it again. However, now the breach is closed and the Doctor and Rose can no longer see each other. Sad times. Rose has her father, her mother, and Mickey, though, which you’d think would make her happy. Using a holographic communiqué, the Doctor is able to say goodbye to Rose, but can’t return her confession of love. Probably because he’s 900 fucking years old and shouldn’t even have thought about falling in love with a 19 year old shopgirl from London. Anyway.

The series ends on a very sad note, followed by a very confusing one when Catherine Tate in a wedding dress somehow ends up on the TARDIS. Audiences would have to wait until Christmas 2006 to figure out what any of that meant. As for Series 2, it’s another mixed bag, but with some very excellent highs. All three two-parters are quite good and a couple of the one-offs are too. Nothing in it is really horrible, but there is a bit of blech for sure. David Tennant, in his first season, really comes on strong and is the Doctor without much time needed to get used to him.

He’d be in need of a new companion in the next series, and while I’m not a huge fan of that companion’s storyline, I think Series 3 is probably my favorite as far as writing and individual plot threads. Come back Wednesday to read why.

This is pretty cool. Our good friend and IDW comic artist Blair Shedd shares a time lapse video of how he goes about drawing a Tenth Doctor portrait, digital style. Just goes to show what a process it is to make an awesome piece of art. You can follow Blair on Twitter and check out his blog. He’s a good dude.